Attack Performance Announces MotoGP CRT Effort

Attack Performance officially announced it will race in the 2012 U.S. Grand Prix and Indianapolis Grand Prix on a Kawasaki-powered Claiming Rule Team machine.

Reports the Huntington Beach, Calif., racing parts manufacturer was granted a wild card to the two American MotoGP rounds surfaced last week, the AMA Pro Racing regular officially confirmed the news just as the 2012 MotoGP World Championship got under way.

Attack Performance is building its own chassis and will use a modified Kawasaki ZX-10R engine to compete in the two races against other CRT entries and factory prototypes. Attack Perforamnce faces a daunting task, but this is the kind of scenario MotoGP organizers were hoping for when they instituted the CRT rules.

The rules allowed the use of production-based engines with prototype chassis. CRT engines may be claimed by another team for a price of 15,000 euros or 20,000 euros for the engine with transmission, thus preventing teams from investing more than the claiming fee on engine development.

“I’ve wanted to design my own chassis for 10 years,” says Richard Stanboli, team owner of Attack Performance, “so this new class structure, essentially a Superbike engine housed in a prototype chassis, has provided an ideal opportunity for me. We have a great deal of work to do before the first event at Laguna Seca, but I’m no stranger to 20-hour days.”

As expected, AMA veteran Steve Rapp will ride the Attack Performance machine in what will be his first career MotoGP races. Rapp is familiar with Laguna Seca which hosts the U.S. Grand Prix, and has experience racing on experimental prototypes after winning a TTXGP electric race at Laguna Seca for Mission Motors.

“Steve and I work well together,” says Stanboli. “Laguna is a difficult track to learn, and we will have a home-court advantage over some of the other CRT teams. Steve has many laps around Laguna, and we intend to hit the ground running.”

[Source: Attack Performance]

Related Reading
Report: Steve Rapp and Attack Performance get MotoGP CRT Wild Card

By Dennis Chung